Uniqueness of garlic [AlliumSativum] phytochemical screening and antibacterial activity of Allium Sativum and its potential as handwashing soap’s additive / Ommy Madina Abdul Halim

Allium sativum known as garlic is a bulbous flowering plant species that belongs to the Amaryllidaceae family and is related to the onion, leeks, and chives. Allium sativum has been acknowledged as a natural product for daily life and it is extensively used in cooking and as vegetable. Due to the biomolecules with nutritional and therapeutic characteristics such as antibacterial properties and antioxidants, garlic has been commercialized in many industrial products such as healthcare supplements. Thus, this study was conducted to extract Allium sativum and examine its antibacterial activity as well as its potential as a handwashing soap. Allium sativum was extracted by using Soxhlet extraction and 24.73% extraction yield was obtained. Next, the Allium sativum extracts was characterized using FTIR and phytochemical screening analysis to identify the functional group and the presence of phytochemical constituents. From FTIR analysis, the predominant functional group in the extracted Allium sativum was 1016.14 cm-1 for an organosulfur compound comparable to the previous research study. Besides that, phytochemical constituents such as saponins, flavonoids, and phenolics were detected at high amounts while amino acids were detected only at trace amounts and it is consistent with many published studies. Moreover, antibacterial activity was conducted to represent the ability of extracted Allium sativum to inhibit the bacterial growth which potential as antibacterial handwashing soap. By that, the handwashing soap from extracted Allium sativum was successfully prepared. The prepared handwashing soap from extracted Allium sativum has a pH of 9.97 which demonstrated it is safe to be used on skin. As a result, extracted Allium sativum has a high ability for health therapeutic products such as handwashing soap formulation with the proven antibacterial activity.